This unit holds one past tense: the preterite, the tense you reach for when you tell what happened and the action is finished — the endings, the two written accents, the spelling changes and the irregulars. Study Cards build the forms one at a time, Helpful Hints keep the charts and the traps in one place, the Practice Quiz checks you in three tiers, and the Workshop puts you to work labeling, sorting, ordering and explaining.
A line of time. Now sits on the right. Behind it sits one action in a box shut at both ends — it started, and it finished.
That mark has a name: the written accent — in Spanish, the tilde. Hablo is what I do now. Habló is what he did and finished. The accent moves the time and the person at the same time.
What people get wrong
⚠️People often think…
The mark on habló is decoration. Hablo and habló are the same word.
They are two different words. Hablo means I speak, right now, and the speaker is me. Habló means he or she spoke, and it is over. One mark changed the person and the time together.
A missing accent is a wrong word, not a typo.
⚠️People often think…
The yo past of buscar is buscé, because you only add the ending.
It is busqué. A c in front of an e is read like an s, so Spanish writes qu to keep the hard k sound. Llegar adds a silent u to guard its g — llegué. Empezar swaps z for c — empecé. Only the yo form moves; buscaste, llegó and empezaron are spelled plainly.
-car, -gar, -zar become qu, gu, c — in the yo form only.
⚠️People often think…
Every past yo form takes an accent, so tener gives tuvé and hacer gives hicé.
The irregular verbs build a new stem and wear no written accent at all: tuve, tuvo, hice, hizo, dije, dijo, fui, fue. Their stress already sits on the first syllable, so Spanish has nothing to mark. Only the regular preterites mark yo and él.
Irregular verb, no mark. Put the pencil down.
⚠️People often think…
Tú forms end in s, so the past is hablastes and comistes.
The tú preterite ends in -aste or -iste and stops there: hablaste, comiste, viviste. It is the one tú form in Spanish that takes no final s. The extra s is heard often and written never.
No s after -aste or -iste.
Stem, ending, accent
1Watch one
Él ____ a las seis. (comer)
Comer is an -er verb.
Cut off -er. The stem is com-.
The él ending in that row is -ió.
com- plus -ió gives comió.
The accent sits on the ó, so the voice lands at the end. Él comió a las seis. ✓
2Do one with me
Three blanks, one from each family. Cut the ending off, then add the row.
Ayer yo ____ con mi abuela. (hablar)
Ella ____ el pan. (comer)
Ellos ____ en Texas. (vivir)
💬One sentence, then you move on
What does the mark on the last letter tell a reader?
3Try one
Yo ____ un regalo en la tienda. (buscar)
I want a hint first
The yo ending is -é. But a c in front of an e is read like an s, and buscar has to keep its hard k sound — so the c is written qu.
💬Last one — then you’re done here
Why does buscar change its spelling in the yo form, and nowhere else?
Where this goes
Where this lives
Telling someone what happened yesterday, or writing an incident down so it reads as finished.
What this feeds
Next unit is the imperfect and telling a story — the other past tense, and the one that paints the scene.
Name one thing you finished yesterday, and write it with a preterite verb.
One card at a time — tap “Show me” to check yourself, then Next. Start at Foundation; when those feel easy, climb.
Helpful Hints
🧭 The unit in one line
The preterite tells what happened → cut off -ar, -er or -ir → add one of two rows of endings → put a written accent on yo and on él/ella → fix the yo form of -car, -gar and -zar verbs → change i to y between vowels → learn the irregulars, which wear no accent at all.
Two rows. Two accents. Three spelling fixes.
🔑 The one idea
The preterite is for a closed action: it started, it finished, and you can say when. Hablo is now. Habló is then. That small mark over the o is not decoration — it carries the person and the time at the same time.
⚠️ Traps to avoid
Hablo is now; habló is then. Dropping the accent does not make a small mistake — it makes a different word.
The yo form of -car, -gar and -zar verbs changes spelling: busqué, llegué, empecé. Never buscé, llegé or empezé.
Irregular preterites carry no written accent: tuve, tuvo, hice, hizo, dije, dijo, fui, fue. Not tuvé, not hicé.
The tú form ends in -aste or -iste, with no s on the end: hablaste, comiste. Not hablastes.
After a j the ellos ending drops its i: dijeron, trajeron, condujeron. Not dijieron.
Fui, fue and fueron belong to ser and to ir at the same time. Only the rest of the sentence tells you which.
For -ar and -ir verbs the nosotros form looks the same now and then: hablamos, vivimos. The time word decides.
📐 The two rows of endings
Person
-ar (hablar)
-er / -ir (comer, vivir)
Accent?
yo
hablé
comí · viví
yes
tú
hablaste
comiste · viviste
no
él · ella · usted
habló
comió · vivió
yes
nosotros
hablamos
comimos · vivimos
no
vosotros
hablasteis
comisteis · vivisteis
no
ellos · ustedes
hablaron
comieron · vivieron
no
-er and -ir share the whole right-hand column.
🔧 The irregulars, as a chant
New stems: tener → tuv-, estar → estuv-, poder → pud-, poner → pus-, saber → sup-, hacer → hic-, querer → quis-, venir → vin-, decir → dij-, traer → traj-. All of them take -e, -iste, -o, -imos, -isteis, -ieron, and none of them takes a written accent. After a j the last ending is -eron: dijeron, trajeron. Two spelling notes: hacer is hizo in the él form, and ser and ir share fui, fuiste, fue, fuimos, fuisteis, fueron.
“Write hablar, comer and vivir all the way through the preterite.”
A sentence with a blank — “Ayer yo ____ tarde a la escuela (llegar).”
“Why is it busqué and not buscé?”
Two sentences side by side — “Which one is hablo and which is habló, and how do you know?”
“Tell what you did yesterday in four sentences, with one irregular verb in them.”
✅ Before the test, can you…
Write both rows of regular endings from memory?
Put the written accent on the two forms that need it, and only those two?
Fix the yo form of buscar, llegar and empezar, and say why each one changes?
Say the ten irregular stems as a chant, and give their shared endings?
Tell ser from ir in a sentence that uses fui or fueron?
Name four time words that call for the preterite?
📚 Go to the sources
These open another website and need the internet. On the Real Academia Española pages, look for the word Conjugar next to the entry and open the full table — that is the same chart you are learning, written by the people who keep the language’s record.
Look back at anything you missed — the hint that appeared is exactly what to reread tonight.
How sure did you feel?
Workshop
Work like a storyteller in Spanish: label the two endings charts, sort fourteen verbs by what changes in them, put one ordinary day back in order, then explain what a single accent does to a sentence.
Your practice never leaves this device. There is no account and no sign-in. Your work is saved in this browser only, and you can erase it whenever you want.
Your practice record — saved on this device
This is your record of the module on screen — it stays here and goes nowhere. Independent means you got it right on the first tap; supported means you got it after the explain-and-retry, or marked ‘I had it’ on a revealed answer. Both count, and neither is a grade. If your teacher asks, copy the row or show them this screen.
Date
—
Topic
—
Level
—
Independent
0 of 0
Supported
0 of 0
Hints used
0
Cards studied
0
Lab
—
Traps met
0
Explained in own words
0
Confidence
—
The answer key is for a teacher: it prints only from here, for the unit on screen. Print the study packet prints the study pages and a blank quiz — never the answers.